No One Ever Left Behind

JOURNAL
18: “We stormed the beaches of Normandy and have begun our push
into theNazi
heartland. We’ve traveled through France and made it about 100
miles from the gates of Germany.
Our platoon is currently stationed in an abandoned town that we found
on the way. Iread
a damaged sign in the front of the town and figured out that the name
of it is Dolfenberg.

I’ve
been with my squad for a few weeks already and I’ve already
started assessing each of them.

First,
Captain Hudson, the one who tells us what we have to do. He’s
on the more aggressive side and has the ambition to complete the
objective, no matter the cost. Next, Sergeant Pierson, our medic
who’s also the second in charge. If anything happens to Hudson,
he’s the one that takes the leading role. Then it is Private
Washington, who is a private just like me, and is getting his first
experience of battle right now. He struggles with the anxiety of not
knowing what happens next. Finally, Corporal Sanchez, the friend of
Captain Hudson. I guess they both lived in Fresno, California and
knew each other for years. Well, I better get going now, Hudson’s
gonna kill me if I’m not there in a minute.”Private
David Campbell quickly closed his journal and put it in his inner
pocket. “DAVID GET OVER HERE!” bellowed Hudson.

“Now
that everyone’s here, I can finally start talking,”
Hudson said glaring at David. “Our mission is to infiltrate
German camp 10 miles east of here. We have orders to silently takethe
camp in order to not attract enemy reinforcements and to sabotage
their artillery weaponry”

“Why
can’t we just go guns blazing on them with multiple platoons?
Our superiornumbers
would destroy them before any reinforcements come,” wondered
Washington.

“Just
listen to what the Captain says man! He’s been in many missions
and I can tell you90%
of them were a success,” answered Sanchez.

“Alright
then, time to do the dirty work,” replied Washington.

The
squad then separated for a few minutes to load up and gather the
things they needed. Davidtook
his M1 Garand, knife, a silenced M1911, and the small Bible that he
always carried around.He
said a small prayer and noticed that all of his squad was doing the
same thing. For any partsof
the war, all people had was faith that they would get through it. The
war was long andchanged
the lives of those who survived it.
“Ok
everybody, let’s go! Better to get this over with now than
later,” yelled Hudson. The
squad marched briskly along a half-destroyed side road because they
did not want tobe
seen by enemy spotters. About three hours later, when they were about
half a mile away fromthe
camp, the platoon stealthily made their way to a small hilltop so
they could see the campbelow
them. Hudson, Pierson, and David pulled out their army issue
binoculars to examinewhere
to infiltrate the camp from. Suddenly they all heard someone moaning.
It was Sanchez andhe
was grabbing his stomach.

“Uhhhh,”
moaned Sanchez. “I feel really sick all of a sudden.”

“For
crying out loud! What happened now?” whispered Pierson.

“Can
you get through it?” asked Hudson.

“I
don’t think so, I feel feverish combined with sharp pain like
someone is kicking me in the
stomach right now,” said Sanchez slowly.

“Well,
I don’t think there’s any turning back now,” added
Washington.

“No,
but there has to be a way we can sort this out,” replied
Hudson.

The
only one that didn’t say anything was David, because he was
looking around him tofind
a solution. A minute later he saw the burnt ruins of a half-bombed
house and said, “What ifwe
hide him in that house over there while we execute the mission and
collect him when wecome
back?” The rest of the platoon looked at each other and slowly
began to nod in agreement.So
that is what the platoon decided to do. They found a small corner
room in the ruin that wasmostly
intact and also put a few boxes and other debris in front of Sanchez
so he was not visible.Hudson
gave Sanchez a field radio just in case anything happened to him or
the group.

The
group carried on with their mission and were very efficient when
disabling the heavyartillery
of the German camp. All of them used their M1911’s to be as
silent as possible whileeliminating
the German sentries. Once they cleared the camp, Hudson used his
radio to contact some of the troops in Dolfenberg. After about 45
minutes, some Allied troops arrived to securethe
camp and to relieve the platoon.

“Wait,
we need to rescue Sanchez from that house,” said David.

“Oh
right, I almost forgot about that,” replied Hudson.The
four told the soldiers that were with them what they were doing and
went back to theruins
where they had previously hidden Sanchez. “Sanchez, it’s
me, David, we’re back,” yelledDavid
but there was no reply. Washington moved the boxes aside and saw that
there was no onethere.
The only thing that remained was the field radio that Hudson had left
with him. For a fewminutes,
no one said a word and an ominous silence surrounded the platoon as
they consideredthe
worst possible outcomes for their platoon member and friend.

“It’s
better to have four of us return back to the base right now than to
have possibly allof
us get killed trying to find one person,” added Washington.

“Stop,
both of you! David’s right, we can’t just leave him, he’s
a human just like all of us. Think about others for a change! If you
were Sanchez right now I think all of you would trust each other to
come to your rescue. I know we aren’t the closest of friends
and have only knowneach
other for only a few weeks, but all we have out here is each other.
God brought us all

together
for a special reason and we have to embrace each other as friends and
brothers in arms.We
are going to find Sanchez because we never leave anyone behind.”

There
was a moment of silence before Pierson and Washington realized their
folly andagreed
to find Sanchez. Meanwhile, Sanchez was in a very sticky situation
while the group wasdebating
to find him or not. The reason why Sanchez left the house was because
he heard a group of Germans marching towards him. He quickly got out
of the house and tried to get away.Sanchez
then realized that he was going to be surrounded by Germans. There
was a small clocktower
a hundred feet away from him and he decided that he would hide in the
tower until theGermans
passed through the area. He climbed the tower and then found a way
through a blockedoff
area that led to the top of the tower. Sanchez then became very tired
due to his fever and fellasleep.

Sanchez
woke up to the sounds of the German language being spoken from
somewherebelow
him. He peered out of a small window on the top of the tower and was
shocked to seeGermans
walking all around the tower and machine gun nests already planted
nearby. Sanchezremembered
the radio that Hudson had given him for emergencies and looked
desperately in hispocket,
but was horrified to realize that he had forgotten it in the other
house. For a few minutes,he
panicked and thought of what he should do. He then saw a big glass
shard from a shatteredmirror
on the dusty floor. He quickly grabbed the mirror and decided that he
would try and signalhis
team using Morse Code with the reflection of the light from the
glass. The code word that hewould
transmit was Fresno because he and Hudson lived there.

Meanwhile,
the rest of the platoon began looking for Sanchez. The platoon split
up withHudson
and Washington going one way while David and Pierson went another.
They searchedfor
a few hours when suddenly David noticed the flashing light from the
clock tower. Hewondered
what it meant since he did not have a clear understanding of Morse
Code. Piersonknew
a little bit, figuring out that the first letter was an F. David
pulled out his field radio andsaid,

“Capt.
Hudson, this is David, we think we found something
important. Our location is approximately 285 East on top of the hill.
Over.”

“Copy
that. we are heading to you. Over,” replied Hudson. Hudson and
Washington came over to David and Pierson’s position about 20
minutes later. Hudson examined the light pattern and declared that it
said, FRESNO.

“That
has to be him,” said a relieved Washington.

“How
are we going to get him out of there? That place is swarmed with
Nazi’s,” askedPierson.

“The
camp we infiltrated had artillery shells, we’re going to use
one of the big shells,detonate
it in the opposite direction that we are heading, and quickly grab
Sanchez.”, orderedHudson.

“I’ll
go and get Sanchez, it’s better to have anything happen to me
than to all of us.”,declared
David.

“I’m
going to tell the guys at the camp that I need a large caliber shell
and then we can getstarted.
Good luck, David,” replied Hudson.

The
three members of the platoon waited for about an hour before Capt.
Hudson came back.David
crept down the hill and close to the camp. He took the Bible out of
his pocket and put it inhis
jacket in front of his heart and prayed, “Whatever I do right
now is for the Lord,”. He waited a few minutes until he heard
a deafening blast from the explosion behind the tower. The second he
saw the German sentries screaming and running towards the decoy
bombing thinking it was an attack, he sprinted towards the tower. He
saw that the bottom of the tower was clear of any Nazis and started
sprinting up the steps, three at a time. He made his way to the
section that Sanchez blocked off and yelled for him to open it.
Sanchez moved the barricade and they both ran out of the tower. David
told Sanchez to go to the platoon first so he could protect him from
the rear. While they were running, a German soldier saw the two
running and fired his pistol. David cried in pain as he was shot in
the back and had to be half dragged up the hill. The next thing he
could remember hearing were the cries of many American troops rushing
towards the tower and firing on the Germans.

David
woke up to a medic and his assistant standing over him.

“Well,
our hero made it through,” said the doctor.

“What
happened to me, where am I, and where’s my platoon?”,
asked David

“Your
platoon is still fighting the retreating enemy, young man. while you
were out forthe
last 2 days, you were rewarded the Medal of Honor for saving your
platoon member,congratulations,”
replied the doctor.David’s
recovery took quite a long time due to the severe injury to his
spine. Many nowlooked
at him as an American war hero and respected him for his selfless act
of heroism andsacrifice.
Many years later when the war ended, he was reunited with his platoon
and theyformed
a lifelong friendship that was intended for them. David rescuing
Sanchez actually helped the
Allies significantly push into the Nazi Heartland as his story of
loyalty and courage inspiredthe
weary Allied soldiers to persevere against all odds. Many heroes like
David are found in ourworld,
whether they are in the military or in everyday civilian life. There
is never a reason toforget,
abandon, or leave a person behind because they are humans just like
anyone else anddeserve
unconditional caring.

*****

My name is Christopher Mathai and I am a high school sophomore in Watsonville CA. I enjoy reading, sportsand travel.